Big Thompson River floodwaters split Loveland in two

River jumps banks, forcing road closures and evacuations throughout the city

By Jessica Maher and Craig Young Reporter-Herald Staff Writers

Posted:
09/12/2013 09:56:52 PM MDT

Youngsters watch for pumpkins floating past an area along the Big Thompson River just north of Mariana Butte Golf Course on Thursday afternoon after heavy rains caused flooding in Loveland, Colo.
(
STEVE STONER
)

Alicia Rowley looks Thursday at the much-closer "waterfront view" of the Big Thompson River behind the Waterford Place Apartments in Loveland as the river floods the area. Residents of the complex were evacuated.
(
Jenny Sparks
)

LOVELAND -- Days of persistent rain and a torrent of water released into the Big Thompson River essentially split the city of Loveland in two Thursday evening.

The river was running at least 7,000 cubic feet of water per second, overflowing its banks, undercutting and overrunning roads and causing evacuations, closures and a declaration of an emergency.

"All eyes are on the river," said city of Loveland spokesman Tom Hacker. "That's every public works employee, every firefighter, every police officer."

Around 9:45 a.m. Thursday, city officials issued a mandatory evacuation order along the Big Thompson River corridor all the way through Loveland, sending 610 automated calls to homes and businesses within the 100-year flood plain.

The evacuations had been voluntary early Thursday morning but became mandatory when the city's Emergency Command Center was up and running.

"Our most significant objective was to identify areas of evacuation," said Loveland Fire Rescue Authority Chief Randy Mirowksi, who is the incident commander for the flood.

Apartments Evacuated

"We didn't even notice the river rising," said Robert Rowley, the maintenance lead at Waterford Apartments, which overlooks the typically tame river at South Lincoln Avenue and Southeast 14th Street.

"Overnight it went from normal to out of control," he said. Firefighters were going door to door in the complex early Thursday afternoon, telling residents they needed to leave.

Early Thursday morning, U.S. 34 was closed by rock falls west of Loveland, and the Larimer County Sheriff's Office issued 600 evacuation notices for people living in the Big Thompson Canyon.

Later Thursday morning, the rushing river undercut the highway near Drake, causing the road to collapse.

High water also forced the closure of U.S. 34 at Glade Road, closer to Loveland.

Widespread Effort

During a press conference shortly after noon Thursday, Larimer County Sheriff Justin Smith said all agencies are working together on the widespread disaster.

"Everything from Estes Park to the east side of Loveland, we're evacuating people in that flood plain," he said.

In contrast to flooding also occurring in Fort Collins along the Cache la Poudre River, the problem in Loveland isn't just the significant, prolonged rainfall amounting to several inches, but the release of water into the Big Thompson River from Lake Estes in Estes Park.

Because Lake Estes was receiving so much runoff from rain in the mountains, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation released water through Olympus Dam throughout the day into the river.

Pregnant goats and a llama are trapped on a small patch of land as the Big Thompson River floodwaters rise Thursday at River Ranch Goats & Gardens in Loveland.
(
Jenny Sparks
)

Loveland spokesman Hacker said city departments started preparing early for the surges of water.

Anticipating early on that the flooding had the potential to essentially split the city in half, the city deployed its resources to the north and the south.

In many places where the river ran close to a road, crews eventually closed that roadway - including the intersection of First Street and Taft Avenue, Colorado 402 east of Lincoln Avenue and South St. Louis Avenue at Southeast Eighth Street.

By 9 p.m., city crews were struggling to keep South Wilson Avenue open as one of the last remaining river crossings.

Mirowski said firefighters also worked in the Big Thompson Canyon west of Loveland, where they assisted with five rescues throughout the day.

"We put ourselves in a position where if we had to, we could operate from three different positions," he said.

Animal rescues were cut off at a point when the situation became dire, Mirowski said.

Stranded Goats

That left Bethie Sairob pleading for help at River Ranch Goats and Gardens south of the Big Thompson River off Rossum Drive in west Loveland, where nine goats and two llamas were stranded on a patch of high ground in the middle of the swollen river.

"We lost everything. We don't want to lose the goats," Sairob said.

According to Northern Colorado 5 TV news, neighbors helped rescue all but four of the goats. Emergency crews ordered the neighbors to stop as the river was rising.

Standing in a flooded field, Bethie Sairob calls to her pregnant goats that are trapped on a patch of land as the Big Thompson River flood waters rise at River Ranch Goats & Gardens in Loveland on Thursday.
(
Jenny Sparks
)

Roads were closed throughout the day as water levels rose, and by 1 p.m., Loveland Public Works Director Keith Reester said his department had bled its private contractor dry of an entire stock of traffic control barricades.

City Manager Bill Cahill declared a state of emergency and later briefed the City Council on a situation that's likely to continue for days.

"We have been working throughout the day to make sure that Loveland residents are safe, that we have taken people out of sensitive areas and that we're protecting property to the degree that we can," he said Thursday afternoon.

Drinking Water OK, City Says

The city's water treatment plant hasn't been compromised and is operating normally, according to a press release from Loveland Water and Power spokeswoman Gretchen Stanford.

The plant is receiving raw water from Green Ridge Glade Reservoir only, and Loveland water quality continues to meet water treatment requirements, she said.

Anticipating the possibility that students would be stranded, the Thompson School District released its students between 10:30 and 11 a.m. Thursday, forcing parents to rush to schools to pick up their children.

Kaylene LaSart, a resident of the Waterford Apartments, said she had to hurry from her job in Greeley to pick up her three children from their Loveland schools.

For a while Thursday, they watched debris float past their third-floor apartment: "We've watched a mattress go by, a bunch of pumpkins, a basketball, lots of dead trees."

Then they got word of the mandatory evacuation and started packing up.

All along the river, residents flocked to watch the rushing, muddy flow.

Kaci Thompson of Fort Collins and her friend, Maggie Howard of Loveland, took up a position on the South Lincoln Avenue bridge. They laughed and took pictures as they saw a yellow rubber duck float past.

In the back corner of the lot, closest to the overflowing Big Thompson, sat an 8-by-20-foot metal storage container in several feet of water, along with many other containers and stored cars, campers and boats.

He said the container he was renting contains an assortment of things, including some old tools he inherited from his father and other tools he uses in his construction work.

"They're supposed to be airtight," he said of the shipping container. "I highly doubt it, but you never know."

The sign at Big T Auto Brokers said "Closed," but employees still were inside the business just north of the river on South Lincoln Avenue.

Despite the swelling river and the evacuation order, they couldn't leave, one said, because some customers were still out on test drives in Big T cars.